The 55-year-old leader broke his fast on Wednesday night after the Centre bowed to his demand for creation of a separate Telangana state.

Even as chief minister K Rosaiah feigned ignorance of the resignations, a Cabinet meeting late in the evening saw the Andhra and Rayalaseema ministers take on their Telangana counterparts. Rosaiah, whose weak administration was completely caught unawares by the accelerating fury of the Telegana campaign, watched helplessly.

“Ironically, the same ministers had earlier in the day appealed to the Congress MLAs who resigned to take back their resignations. The Congress move on Telangana now has the political leaders of the three regions at daggers drawn. It’s chaos, it’s mayhem,” one ruling party legislator said. “I don’t know why Sonia Gandhi has shot herself in the foot,” he added.

Telengana Rashtra Samiti chief K Chandrasekhar Rao, whose 11-day fast fuelled a surge of violent sub-nationalism, sipped coconut water late on Wednesday to end his protest but remained in hospital under medical advice. But across Hyderabad, jubilation broke out masking the serious political uncertainities.

Of the 93 MLAs from Andhra and Rayalaseema regions who resigned, 53 belong to the Congress, 29 to TDP and 11 to PRP. The MPs who submitted their resignations to Lok Sabha speaker Meira Kumar were Lagadapati Rajagopal and Ananta Venkatarama Reddy (both Cong) and M V Mysura Reddy, Harikrishna and K Narayaswamy, all of the TDP. More MPs from both the parties are expected to follow suit.

The backlash to creating Telangana has put Congress on the backfoot and brought about a complete volte face by the two opposition parties on the separate state issue. Forced to kow-tow to angry party MPs from Andhra and Rayalaseema, Congress president Sonia Gandhi told them in New Delhi on Thursday that all views will be taken into account before a final decision is taken on the creation of Telangana. Late Thursday evening, a group of 22 Congress MPs were meeting with AICC observer Veerappa Moily to discuss a way out of the impasse that threatens to erode Congress’s hold in AP.

“If an election is held soon, the Congress will be routed in all regions, whereas the credit for Telangana will be taken by KCR who would have no qualms in joining the BJP. In fact, the Congress staunch ally the MIM was also thrown in a tizzy and late at night mulling over whether Telangana would benefit it or would an independent state of Hyderabad.

A resolution had to be adopted by the state legislature to legally start the separation and the impending T resolution has plunged the opposition TDP and PRP into complete chaos. After having touted their support for Telangana until a day earlier (in the belief that it will never be okayed by the Congress bosses), both TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu and PRP chief Chiranjeevi on Thursday called the decision to press for a resolution on Telangana unilateral. “The Congress has not taken the people who are the main stakeholders, apart from the political leaders, into confidence before announcing its decision on Telangana.
It proposed to move the resolution without following due procedures and guidelines and without holding a proper discussion in the house. “My legislators resigned because they feared they could not face the people in their respective constituencies,” Naidu told the media even as the resignation drama unfolded in the assembly on Thursday.

Prajarajyam’s Chiranjeevi said the Congress “attitude is not acceptable. If the state has to be divided, no region should suffer loss and this issue should be resolved first,” he told the media and demanded a thorough and proper discussion on how to fulfil the aspirations of people of the other regions before the resolution on Telangana is passed. In New Delhi, the CPM expressed its strong reservations against the division of Andhra Pradesh.

In the morning, the assembly convened at 9.00am and legislators from the Andhra and Rayalaseema regions cutting across party lines were seen discussing the previous day’s development. At 11am, Congress MLA J C Diwakar Reddy (from Tadipatri in Anantapur district) walked upto the speaker and submitted his resignation and this opened the floodgates. By 2pm, 93 of them had put in their papers.

Apart from Diwakar Reddy, prominent among those who submitted their resignations from the Congress are D L Ravindra Reddy from Mydokuru constituency in Kadapa district, E Pratap Reddy from Srisailam constituency in Kurnool district, T G Venkatesh from Kurnool and A Prabhakar Reddy from Surveypalli in Nellore district.

From the opposition TDP, D Umameshwara Rao from Mylavaram in Krishna district, D Narendra Kumar from Ponnur in Guntur district, B Gopalakrishna Reddy from Srikalahasti, P Keshav from Uravakonda in Anatapur district were among the 29 who resigned. From PRP, Shobha Nagi Reddy from Allagadda assembly constituency in Kurnool, K Rami Reddy from Banaganapalle and V Geeta from Pithapuram in East Godavari district were the prominent ones to resign.

Delhi: Worldwide external controller-based (ECB) disk storage revenue totaled more than $3.9 billion in the third quarter of 2009, a 7.3 percent decline from the same period in 2008, according to Gartner.

“The year-over-year decline of 7.3 percent indicates that the economic downturn’s impact on the disk array storage market is loosening its grip. The prior two quarters in 2009 showed declines in the double digits. This is good news for storage vendors, because it’s the first sign of a light at the end of the tunnel,” said Donna Taylor, Principal Research Analyst for Gartner’s global Storage Quarterly Statistics program.

EMC maintained its No. 1 position with 26.7 percent revenue market share. EMC’s market share is more than double that of its closest competitor, IBM, which placed second with 13.2 percent. HP came in third with 10.8 percent. Hitachi, Dell and NetApp ranked fourth, fifth and sixth, respectively, by the narrowest of margins. Hitachi achieved an 8.8 percent market share, while Dell and NetApp each achieved 8.6 percent. Dell and NetApp’s revenue was separated by only $2 million. Sun Microsystems placed seventh with 3.6 percent market share.

The Indian ECB market dropped a significant 20 percent on a year on year basis, contrary to global trends and totaled $43 million in July August September, 2009. IBM, EMC and Sun Microsystems continued to be the top three vendors and together accounted for 61 percent share of all ECB revenues in India in the last quarter. “The tide will change soon” says Aman Munglani, Principal Analyst, Gartner. “While the previous three quarters saw a downturn in the storage industry, there was a strong pick up in demand during the month of September and many deals spilled over to the next quarter. The momentum is here to stay with a return to growth in 2010,” he added.

The Equal Opportunity team at Infosys BPO has organized several games and events such as collage competition, relay race, dance, mime and awards for their 190 differently abled employees to commemorate world disability day. The company supports differently abled people from the application stage to their induction into a team. Sensitization workshops are conducted for regular employees to increase awareness about disability and to foster a positive environment.

“I joined Infosys BPO in 2007 and am now a senior process executive in the account payable process for a U.S. customer, who selected me to visit them in the U.S. to transition and streamline a particular process,” says Shalini Aggarwal, who is a hearing impaired.

“Disability access audits of our offices has resulted in ramps and accessible washrooms in our newly constructed offices, special software is provided to the visually impaired and regular employees are trained to evacuate disabled employees as part of disaster preparedness,” says Raghavendra K, VP and Head, Human Resources, Infosys BPO. A focused approach to induct differently abled individuals into the company is evident in the company’s recruitment ad which clearly states ‘differently abled individuals are also eligible to apply.’

Vinyas Innovative Technologies, an electronic hardware manufacturing solutions company, employs eight mentally challenged and 26 hearing impaired youngsters. “These youngsters work very hard, perform consistently delivering the same quality of work and never lie, as a result of which every one else in the company has changed for the better,” says N Narendra, Founder of Vinyas, who plans to hire many more differently abled youngsters in 2010.

MphasiS, an HP company, has over 300 people (one percent of their workforce) with disabilities in their workforce across businesses. Wipro does not track the number of disabled staff on its rolls. The company is running a signature campaign where employees will sign up to say that they will support and encourage differently abled colleagues in the workplace. “All Wiproites have been asked to wear the blue and yellow (the colours of disability) to work tomorrow to show that they care. And NGOs who work with the disabled have been invited to display and sell their products at our campus tomorrow,” said a Spokesperson from Wipro.

Similarly, MindTree does not keep track of the number of disabled employees. “They do not like to avail of the statutory government benefits due to them, nor be differentiated as differently enabled. They want to be treated on par with regular staff. Therefore, we consider them as MindTree minds, just like the others,” talent acquisition Head Sanjay Shelvankar says.

Interestingly, the MindTree Foundation has been working for the last six months on a new initiative called affordable assistive technology solutions for the disabled. The foundation has considered 21 different assistive technology initiatives to address individuals with cerebral palsy and musculo-skeletal disorders, of which 14 have moved beyond the initial evaluation and are in various stages of development.

“The idea is to provide solutions such as, single access switches for less than Rs. 1,000 and augmentative/alternative devices which are almost like computers for less than Rs. 10,000,” says Raja Shanmugam, CEO of MindTree Foundation.

While many students from the city got intimation on cancellation of the test through email and SMSes, the IIMs have not updated the information on their official website www.catiim.in. till late on Thursday night.

“The students were told that they might have to attempt their test from cities other than Hyderabad. This has come as a shock to many as none of them would want to travel so far,” Jaideep Singh Chowdry, CAT coordinator at a city coaching centre, said. He added it was not known whether all candidates were intimated about cancellation. “It could be that CAT in some of the labs in MVSR and JNTU were cancelled. The IIMs have not come up with a statement so far,” he said.

Meanwhile, some who took the test successfully on earlier dates were asked to take it again “I had taken the test in the morning slot on Nov. 29 without any hitches. Around 6 pm on Thursday, I got an SMS from IIMs asking me to take the test again on Dec. 6. This is ridiculous,” a student said. However, students whose tests were cancelled are yet to be intimated about their rescheduled test dates.

KCR who was shifted from Khammam hospital to Nims, Hyderabad, on Thursday morning made his ‘offer’ to the Congress when ruling party leaders T Purushottam Rao, P Goverdhan Reddy, P Narasa Reddy and K R Amos called on him. “KCR has placed himself in a tight spot. If he calls off the ‘hunger strike’ without any assurance from the Centre, students will not spare him. It is for the Congress to decide whether to call him for talks,” said a Congress leader.

AICC working committee member K Keshava Rao is said to be the mediator. It was the fifth day of the ‘fast’. Nims doctors said he was given saline drip, insulin and tablets. His urine samples indicated ‘symptoms of starvation’ but his blood pressure and sugar levels were normal.

KCR’s SOS to the Congress was based on inputs that the movement, which saw students in the forefront for the first time since the separatist movement of the late sixties, has gone beyond the control TRS ‘control’. “They attacked the houses of TRS MP Vijayashanti and Congress MLA from Uppal B Raji Reddy. The inputs from the districts and Osmania University is that the students will not listen to even KCR now. Has KCR started something that even he can’t control?” wondered a TRS leader.

When his vehicle was going through Mallikarjun Nagar, live wires fell in front of his open top vehicle. His security officials who saw the wires tried to clear them with the help of bamboo sticks. When doing so, they came into contact with each other due to which there were some sparks. Chiranjeevi ducked to save himself and then continued with the campaign.

Meanwhile, Balamani Reddy, 51, the PR contestant from Uppal suffered burn injuries when she came into contact with a live wire while campaigning. She was rushed to a hospital.

According to the tour programme released by the PCC here, Mr Rahul Gandhi will spend 45 minutes interacting with the students of Loyola College at Vijayawada, 50 minutes with students in NIT, Warangal, 40 minutes with students of SV University and another 40 minutes with students of Padmavati Women’s University in Tirupati.

According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), out of 1.22 lakh suicides every year in the country, Andhra Pradesh records around 14,224.

The large number of suicides among students and employees of IT companies has to do with increasing competition in the education and employment sectors, say experts.

NCRB analysts observe that while social and economic causes lead to most of the suicides committed by men, women are driven to suicide by emotional and personal causes.

According to the NCRB, in the past decade, there has been a 28 per cent increase in the number of suicides. Maharashtra accounts for the largest share at 12.4 per cent, followed by Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal at 12.1 per cent each.

Dr V. Pramod Kumar, the superintendent of the Mental Health Hospital, Erragadda, says, “Due to the changing economic scenario in the South, there is more competition to grab employment opportunities. Disappointed youth are developing suicidal tendencies. Mental illness can also cause people to commit suicide. The reason can also be genetic.” The NCRB report says that AP has been recording higher numbers of suicides in the past few years. The causes can vary from unemployment, to not being able to have children, to problems at work and non-settlement of marriage.

Osmania Medical College forensics department head, Dr M. Narayana Reddy, says that stress in students, failure in love affairs among the youth, poverty of farmers, unemployment, as among weavers, are “leading to frustration and the person takes recourse to death rather than life.”

Within the state, Karimnagar district has recorded the highest number of suicides, with 1,363 persons ending their lives in 2008, and 840 till September 2009. Adilabad registered 1,334 suicides and next was Kurnool. Srikakulam with 158 suicides was the lowest.

The problems that Gulf immigrants face could account for the large number of suicides in Karimnagar which has a large population of men employed in the Gulf, surmises CID IGP, Mr S. Umapathi.

He reminded the Chief Minister of YSR’s promise to increase power supply to the farm sector to nine hours and the rice quota to 6 kg and said that the credibility of the government would be at stake if the promises were not implemented.

Mr Jagan also opposed the decision to allow four Independent Power Producers (IPPs) including GVK, Vemagiri, Gautami and Konaseema, to sell 20 per cent power in the open market, and asked Mr Rosaiah to reconsider it and utilise that power to enhance supply to farmers.

The Chief Minister was not amused by this and told the MP that the decision to sell the power was taken in 2008 by YSR and he had only signed the agreement.

To this, Mr Jagan said the delay in implementing the decision clearly indicated that YSR had a rethink on the issue.

At this juncture, the minister, Mr Botsa Satyanarayana, interfered and tried to explain what Mr Jagan meant, but Mr Rosaiah cut him short and said, “I know what he meant.”

The Polavaram issue too led to some heated exchanges between Mr K.S. Rao and Mr Madhu Yakshi. The Rajahmundry MP, Mr Vundavilli Arun Kumar, also sought a clarification on the Chief Minister’s stance on Polavaram. He asked Mr Rosaiah to activate the administration and suggested that the Chief Minister follow the footsteps of YSR and go to the public.

However, the Chief Minister did not take it lightly said that he was neither YSR’s age nor has his stamina.

Mr Rosaiah then said there was no reversal of the stand taken by YSR. The Chief Minister, who held a marathon session with MPs from 5 pm to 10 pm, also indicated that the number of drought hit mandals would be increased from 981. He asked MPs to lobby for more aid from the Centre and secure clearances of all pending projects.